This is a collection of songs which (if the Deadhead’s Taping Compendium is to be believed) were to have formed
the basis for the first GD studio album of the 1990’s. The material appears to be a mix of live SBD recordings (possibly
with some minor overdubs) and rehearsals; its doubtful if any of this represents actuall studio recordings aimed at an
album release.

This came into circulation in mid-1997: several sources (including the Compendium) indicate that this was intentionally
put together – possibly by John Cutler and Phil Lesh – and seeded to trading circles to counteract several “last GD album”
bootlegs that had been produced in 1995/1996 (all sourced from 1990 thru 1995 SBD or AUD recordings.

I obtained a cassette copy in the autum of the 1997 from a tree run on the rec.music.gdead newsgroup. In spite of the
numerous efforts to locate anything with a lower number of analog generations, I’ve not been able to discover anything
better than what I have now; nor does this material seem to circulate among DAT users or (until Now) CD traders.

I’ve therefore taken my casette copy and transferred it to the digital domain. The best guess that I have for the annalog
lineage is as follows:

I did the transfer using an AIWA AD-F850 tape deck, played directly into the inputs of a Yamaha DS-XG sound card.
I used CoolEdit 2000 v1.1 to do the initial analog > digital sampling, apply mild noise reduction (my source tape is
somewhat hissy, not surprising give the number of analog generations) and reduce the length of some of the
between-song gaps. I used CD Wav v1.73 to define track boundaries and mkwACT v0.97 to prepare a master
SHN disc (track boundaries verified using SHNtool.)

——Julian Fowler September 2003

From Rolling Stone, Apr 20, 1998

Although it’s common knowledge that the Grateful Dead were in the midst of recording when Jerry Garcia died almost three
years ago, former keyboardist Vince Welnick shed more light on the unfinished album in a recent conversation with the Rolling
Stone Network.

According to Welnick, the album was set to include such tour-tested songs as “Liberty,” “So Many Roads,” “Days Between,”
“Samba in the Rain,” “Way To Go,” “Corrina,” and “Easy Answers,” but Garcia passed away before the tracks could be
completed. “We had just about finished the basics when Jerry checked out,” Welnick said. “It’s a shame, because we spent
a lot of time in there.”

Although the studio tapes from the Grateful Dead’s would-be swan song are still around, Welnick doubts that the album can
be salvaged. “There weren’t even working vocals on some of the songs. There was also very little guitar. If they wanted to make
something of it, they’d probably have to splice in something from one of the show tapes.”

Grateful Dead spokesman Dennis McNally denied that anything will ever come of the album.
“Only [Grateful Dead guitarist] Bobby [Weir] ever thought that anything could be done, but it can’t. Jerry didn’t contribute to it.
Everyone else contributed to it, but Jerry just wasn’t with it. There’s not even a title, to my knowledge.”

Disc One:
1. Bleecker Street
2. Kathy’s Song
3. Bleecker Street
4. Sparrow
5. A Most Peculiar Man
6. Sparrow
7. Tom Wilson Rap
8. Somewhere They Can’t Find Me
9. Bad News Feeling
10. I Wish You Could Be Here
11. Blues Run The Game
12. For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her – take 3
13. For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her – take 4
14. For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her – take 5
15. For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her – take 6
16. For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her – take 7
17. For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her – take 8
18. For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her – take 9
19. For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her – take 10
20. For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her – take 11
21. For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her – take 12
22. For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her – take 13
23. For Emily, Whenever I May Find Her – take 14
24. Overs – take 4
25. Overs – take 5
26. Overs – take 6
27. Overs – take 7
28. Overs – take 8
29. Overs – take 9
30. You Don’t Know Where Your Interest Lies

From the original uploader:
This is the stream of the Simon & Garfunkel early period torrents, 1957-1970, mostly in excellent quality, that will last until the beginning of September, still ratio-free. The music is great, so feel free to enjoy your way!

1) Sugar Mountain (1)
2) Nowadays Clancy Can’t Even Sing (1)
3) Run Around Babe (1)
4) Don’t Pity Me Babe (1)
5) I Ain’t Got The Blues (1)
6) The Rent Is Always Due (1)
7) When It Falls It Falls All Over You (1)
8) Down To The Wire (1)
9) Do I Have To Come Right Out And Say It (1)
10) There Goes My Babe (1)
11) One More Sign (1)
12) The Sultan (2)
13) Aurora (2)

Also from 1967, and of far more interest, is 1984’s professionally recorded Thames Television demo tape.
During his first-year of study at Twickenham Technical College, Dave Dilloway had made friends with a number of technicians, or trainee technicians, at the Teddington-based ITV Company, which served the London area.
The station had recently invested in new recording equipment, and rather than hire professional musicians at the usual union rate, in a set up similar to the first Queen sessions at the De Lane Lea studios, 1984 were let loose in the studio to record at their leisure.
Dave Dilloway’s carefully preserved tape still plays perfectly, and includes the following songs: “Hold On I’m Coming”, “Knock On Wood”, “NSU”, “How Can It Be”, two early run-throughs of the original May/Staffell composition “Step On Me” (which eventually became the B-side to Smile’s “Earth”), “Purple Haze”, “Our Love Is Drifting'”, and medleys of “Remember”/”Sweet Wine” and “Get Out My Life Woman”/”Satisfaction”.
The session ended with a run-through of “My Girl”.

Dave Dilloway has the technical details: “This tape is the most recent, best and most representative of 1984 that I’m aware of.
It is mono, but since it was made on good quality TV studio equipment and was carried out along the lines of a proper studio recording, with separately mixed microphones for each source, it is remarkably good quality for its age.
The material, except for ‘Step On Me’, is all cover versions, but as it dates from the late 1984 era, Brian’s playing is more prominent and effective, with his own style starting to show through.
All the performances are competent – particularly Tim’s vocals and Brian’s guitar; although the mix is a little heavy on John’s rhythm guitar for some reason, probably the ‘ear’ of the recording engineer at the time.
All tracks were laid down in one take, i.e., no overdubbing at all, so the sound is predominantly simple, as per our live versions.”

Tracks 1-10 Recorded in Elektra Records’ studio in New York, September 1965, which might make the session appear more impressive than it actually was. These solo acoustic tracks, Young has recalled, were sung into an old tape recorder on a metal chair. Engineered by Peter Siegel.
First time available in stunning sound quality!

These are evidently very early demos recorded for “car” (1976, Atco – Atco being Atlantic, a Warner subsidiary label). They are extremely raw; they may have been done in Gabriel’s home studio. Most are acoustic piano with a few accompanying support tracks and Peter singing.

The lead sheets had the composer’s names given as “Peter Gabriel and Tony Hall” and were marked with a stamp from Fuse Music, England; they were merely lead melody transcriptions for copyright purposes, not hand-written by Gabriel or anything.

At that time, the best research i could come up with was that Fuse was somehow connected to Warner Bros (maybe like Sire was, but English; a sub-distribution deal?)… I later heard that the Fuse Music building burned down and took a whole lot of master tapes with it, and that this reel is quite probably the only surviving record of these demos.

This brown-oxide tape was discovered rotting in a water-soaked box shoved into a cleaning closet, along with the lead sheets, in a cavernous and seldom-used warehouse. It was lost/forgotten/abandoned. The tape had some warbley spots from the neglect and also quite a lot of tape hiss and lost tone.

I processed the material for several weeks before I was satisfied as to the quality, although “Get the Guns” was problemmatic to begin with; the Master appears to have been recorded badly or with misaligned heads. On the whole there is a tiny bit of tape hiss but no more than you’d expect from such a “live” environment. There is unfortunately one small glitch from a later cassette-to-cd transfer in “Excuse Me” (“Looking for Lost Angeleeeeee”) so don’t think it’s your file or player 🙂

Enjoy this very raw and simple glimpse into the creative process of Peter Gabriel.